Climate change and Utah's health: A profile

Background: Climate change is an increasing concern to the environment and to human health. The Utah Environmental Public Health Tracking Network (UEPHTN) collects and manages environmental and health outcomes data. UEPHTN functions as part of a national network to house data, create nationally consistent data measures, and facilitate data linkages in order to expand our understanding and ability to deal with environmental health issues.Methods: The UEPHT team utilized tracking data and measures to create a ‘Climate Change and Health' profile for Utah residents. This profile includes carefully chosen climate change-related indicators for health. These indicators represent a variety of health impacts that Utahns face or will face due to climate change including, allergic diseases, heat-related illnesses and other temperature-related events, natural disasters and other issues.Results/Conclusions: This profile provides a baseline measure for each of these indicators and a picture of what risks Utahns currently face. This is a resource for the residents of Utah and for health officials and educators and policy makers in the state as they address concerns of climate change and create programs to address those concerns.Learning Objectives: Attendees will leave with a greater understanding of climate change indicators. They will learn methods for examining the health effects of climate change and see examples of these methods. They will learn how to conduct this kind of baseline assessment for their own jurisdictions.